In 'Locke' Tom Hardy's the only actor onscreen

By Mark Olsen

Los Angeles Times

Posted:
05/13/2014 11:20:02 AM PDT

Updated:
05/15/2014 04:13:18 PM PDT

It should be incredibly dull, just a man in his car on the phone. Yet the British film "Locke" wrings deep, suspenseful drama from a man making difficult decisions, from which there will be no turning back, as he drives in his car while talking on the phone.

Tom Hardy plays Ivan Locke -- the only character seen on screen in the film, which opened in late April in the Bay Area. Locke is a construction site foreman who's preparing for the biggest job of his career. The next morning he will oversee the pouring of a massive concrete foundation for a skyscraper.

Yet he is juggling calls as he drives through the night to be beside a woman with whom he had a one-night stand, as she gives premature birth to their baby. His marriage, his family, his career and his future are in jeopardy as he struggles to do what he believes is the right thing.

The film was written and directed by Steven Knight, who wrote David Cronenberg's "Eastern Promises" and was nominated for an Academy Award for his screenplay for Stephen Frears' "Dirty Pretty Things." The directness of the story in "Locke" and its sure-footed unfolding of one revelation after another in only 85 minutes give it a momentum and tension that transcend its simple design.

"It's not an easy one to explain to a friend," says Hardy by phone from London. In the film he dons a Welsh accent and a calm, gentle but firm delivery. In conversation, his voice is higher and reedier than one might expect from his bruising roles in films such as "Bronson," "Inception" and "Lawless" or as the supervillain Bane in "The Dark Knight Rises."

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Car as a moving theater

The inspiration for "Locke" came in part while director Knight was shooting camera tests for his Jason Statham thriller "Hummingbird" (released in the U.S. as "Redemption"). He was taken with the look of nighttime digital photography and the way it turned a car into something like a moving theater. He set out to imagine an everyday drama that could take place in such a setting.

"I tried to make him the most ordinary man in the world," said Knight during a recent interview in Los Angeles. "I passionately didn't want it to be about anything that would make the papers or the local news. ... I think often filmmakers feel they only have permission to make a film if there's a bang in it, a thing that makes it unreal or unusual. I think people really like the idea we turn the camera on an ordinary tragedy, which can happen to anybody."

Knight decided to shoot his story in an unusual way. A BMW SUV would be towed on a trailer around three circuits of roadways near London, with cinematographer Haris Zambarloukos training three cameras on Hardy, whose lines were scrolling on a teleprompter in front of him. (Some footage of Hardy actually driving was edited in as well.) On the other end of Locke's phone was an impressive list of voice talent, including Ruth Wilson, Olivia Colman, Andrew Scott and Alice Lowe, all in a nearby hotel making calls on cue.

The film was shot in just eight nights, with the entire script filmed twice each night. By the end of the shooting, Knight and editor Justine Wright had 16 versions of the story to work from for the final cut.

The filming took place in February 2013, using a brief window between Hardy's work in the title role of the upcoming "Mad Max: Fury Road" in Namibia and in the New York crime thriller "The Drop" (which turned out to be James Gandolfini's last film). Hardy arrived for the shoot suffering from a cold, and so Locke periodically swigs cough syrup.

Subtle transformation

The actor likens the film's unusual process to "a mix of theater, radio and film, all together." He says, "Steven wanted to do something that hadn't been done before. The contained environment of the car made total sense with the material we had. So it was the best way to do it, ... as opposed to shooting it on successive days in small pieces."

For Hardy, an actor who often transforms himself physically for his roles, the challenge was that he would remain stationary, reduced to using just his face and voice.

"Bane and Bronson and other characters I've played -- each has a specific theme or tone and a style of acting you're trying to deliver for the piece ...," Hardy says. "But there was transformation (in Locke) as well," he adds, referring to the beard, soft sweater and overall manner of his character.

"There are different types of transformation, more subtle than putting on a lot of weight and punching people in the face."